A readily reconfigureable cash dispensing system for providing change, such as coins of different values and bills or currency of different denominations needed by a retail store, grocery store, busy convenience store, or the like. A tray or trays for storing and delivering multiple rolls of coins or bills of a first value, as well as, a tray or trays for storing and delivering stacks of bills are described herein. A bill acceptor may be employed to accept bills used to purchase rolls of coins and stacks of bills, and a system controller can sense restocking and dispensing events to maintain an accurate inventory of cash in the bill acceptor, as well as, the total cash stored in the form of coin rolls or rolls bills, as well as, bill stacks.
Legal claims defining the scope of protection, as filed with the USPTO.
1. A cash dispensing system comprising: a change dispensing unit to dispense change comprising: a first storage drawer storing rolls of coins in columns; a slideable first pull drawer which in an open position allows a user to have access to dispensed rolls of coins; a first drive assembly for controllably advancing the rolls of coins until a front most roll of coins falls from the first storage drawer into the first slideable pull drawer; a safe enclosure; a lockable access door including a lock to allow the access door to be opened or securely closed, wherein the first storage drawer is held secured in place by the lockable access door and the first slideable pull drawer blocks access to the rolls of coins stored in the first storage drawer when the first slideable pull drawer is in the open position; and a controller controlling the first drive assembly.
2. The cash dispensing system of claim 1 wherein a vertical distance of the fall from the first storage drawer to the first slideable pull drawer is less than two roll diameters of a largest size coin to be dispensed.
3. The cash dispensing system of claim 1 wherein the drive assembly further comprises: a DC motor per column of the first storage drawer and an associated gearing subassembly to allow a shaft of the DC motor to turn when energized to provide the torque to move all of the rolls of coins in the column controlled by the DC motor.
4. The cash dispensing system of claim 1 further comprising: an interlock mechanism preventing an attempt to dispense a roll of coins from the first storage drawer when the first slideable pull drawer is open.
5. The cash dispensing system of claim 1 wherein the columns within said first storage drawer contain spirals driven by the drive assembly to further advance the rolls of coins, with each spiral having a pitch just larger than the diameter of the roll of coins to be dispensed.
6. The cash dispensing system of claim 1 wherein the first storage drawer also stores stacks of bills, and the first drive assembly further comprises two opposing spirals to hold and advance stacks of bills stored in the first storage drawer.
7. The cash dispensing system of claim 6 wherein each stack of bills includes a wrapper having a detectable indicium thereon.
8. The cash dispensing system of claim 1 further comprising: a second storage drawer storing stacks of bills.
9. The cash dispensing system of claim 1 wherein each roll of coins has a wrapper with a detectable indicium thereon.
10. The cash dispensing system of claim 1 wherein power for the first storage drawer is provided through a floating connector arrangement.
11. The cash dispensing system of claim 1 wherein the first storage drawer stores rolls of coins of a first value employing a spiral of a first pitch, and the first storage drawer stores rolls of coins of a second value employing a spiral of a second pitch.
12. The cash dispensing system of claim 11 wherein the spiral of the first pitch can be readily removed and replaced by a spiral of the second pitch to reconfigure the maximum number of rolls of coins of the second value stored by the cash dispensing system.
13. The cash dispensing system of claim 1 wherein the first storage drawer slides on sliders to slideably extend the first storage drawer outwardly when the door is open to facilitate restocking.
14. The cash dispensing system of claim 13 wherein when the first storage drawer is slideably extended, all rolls of coins in a column of the first storage drawer pass a sensor, and as the first storage drawer is slideably returned fully inside the cash dispensing system, all rolls of coins in the first storage drawer again pass the sensor.
15. The cash dispensing system of claim 1 wherein the rolls of coins are stored in color coded wrappers and the first storage drawer employs a related color coding arrangement to facilitate accurate restocking.
16. The cash dispensing system of claim 1 further comprising: a sensor mechanism associated with the first storage drawer to detect each roll being dispensed.
17. The cash dispensing system of claim 16 , wherein the controller receives inputs from a sensor mechanism when the first storage drawer is closed after stocking, and dynamically tracks an inventory of rolls in the first storage drawer.
18. The cash dispensing system of claim 17 , wherein the controller predicts future restocking needs based upon monitoring current usage.
19. The cash dispensing system of claim 1 further comprising: a payment accepting device to accept payment for dispensed rolls of coins.
20. The cash dispensing system of claim 19 , wherein the controller receives inputs from the sensor mechanism and the payment accepting device to control the first drive assembly to dispense a roll or rolls corresponding in value to the bills to pay for the dispensed rolls.
Cooperative Patent Classification codes for this invention. Click any code to explore related patents in that topic.
January 29, 2013
July 8, 2014
Browse 5M+ US patents with plain-English claim translations and AI-generated analysis.